What the old timers used

[DITCH]

My maternal grandfather, whose house I grew up in, always had a SAK. I keep it in a drawer in his desk. I gave him a small one-hander one Father's Day, but he never took to it.

 

[Grateful]

My Grandad carried a Buck 307. I wish that I had it now.
Jim

 

[300Bucks]

Only knew one Grandfather well, he worked for the Ford garage in his little town in the early 1900s, that is until the owner got caught swindling cattle and it went under, after that he ran a auto salvage yard for the rest of his 80+ years. My mother got this little carbon Schrade Stockman for me, who knows it may have come from inside a salvaged car.....He sharpened all his knives on one of the little grey pocket stones, so I think he didn't clean fish and game with this one, because I saw him touch up the blade on one stockman or another everytime that effort got underway.....300Bucks.

 

[mnblade]

My dad's dad grew up in rural southeast Georgia and worked as a carpenter (the guy could build or fix anything), before moving south to Miami in the 20s where he married my grandma and joined the family glass business. By the time I have any conscious memory of him, he carried a two-blade jack made by Robeson. My dad also says he remembers one time on a family vacation (this would have been in the '40s) when my grandad broke or lost his knife and stopped at a Sears in Savannah to buy another, a two-blade Schrade easy opener with bone handles. Grandad hunted and fished all his life, but only ever carried a common carbon steel pocketknife. When hunting or fishing, they'd take along some knives from the kitchen to process the meat .... that meant Dexter carbon steel knives, one of which I have in my kitchen knife block to this day. Here it is ...



My mom's father was really into knives but never carried one. Sound strange? Well, he fought all through the Battle of Hurtgen Forest and then lost his left arm on Dec. 17, 1944 - the second day of the Battle of the Bulge. With just one arm, a pocketknife back in the pre-Spyderco days wasn't really an option. He did always seem to have a sheath knife around, and kept one in the trunk of his car that we'd inevitably use during picnic lunches on our cross-country road trips. He once described for me the knife he carried before and during the war: Sounded like a Barlow. Pop bought me a few knives as a kid (and a BB gun, and slingshot and ...), but the only one I still have is a Victorinox Classic.

-- Mark

 

[neeman]

My Father's father never carried an knife, he only carried a guillotine cigar cutter in his jacket pocket.

My Mother's father was a tailor and he only used shears on his sewing table!

I have my Father's 1 V Fairbain Sykes wooden handled (fat grip) stiletto from WW2.
It has the copper washer for the pommel nut.
They are meant to quite rare.
Or it is a good copy circa 1945, made in India!
The tip was broken off as a requirement to bring it back to England in 1947.

As a Staff Officer in the Royal Indian Service Corp, he would have had access to these.
He never carried a knife, so what he needed a knife like this is beyond me!

 

[silenthunterstudios]

My Mother's father was a tailor and he only used shears on his sewing table!

My father is an upholsterer, and uses a pair of shears exclusively for food prep exclusively. He usually has a small pen knife, but those shears are used for everything.

 

[gundude73]

my grandfather carried a buck 110. its a bit shorter than a standard one because at one point in time he decided to sharpen it on a grinder

 

[buckgen5]

my grandfather had the kabar combo hatchet and fixed blade knife. i never got it from him but, i did come across the same kind of hatchet w/ stacked leather washers and aluminum butt, it has a mirror polished head/neck and is really thin. i got mine with original sheath at a store owned by a knife collector for 30$ it does remind me of him. my grandfather was in the Korean war and was a retired railroader and dairy farmer and rarely did he ever get to go do any hunting or fishing due to having to be home to take care of his cattle.
Daniel

 

[theblindog]

My grandpa always had an eye brand germany knife in his pocket for slicing tobacco.

falah

 

[spydutch]

Haven't known my father's father too well, but my mother's father always carried a Herder Sodbuster.
So did my dad.

 

[the lone gunman]

When my Grandfather arrived here from Italy he ,like many others, became a Coal Miner. This is what he carried. We had a Party for him on his 100th Birthday,He said he wouldnt live to be 101,He did but passed away on that day. He continued active until 6 months before his passing.

 

[moonwilson]

Here's my Grandfather's well-loved Remington. The pen blade has been snapped off. From the looks of the master blade, he carried, used and sharpened this knife quite a bit! It's an R4255, and an oldie- 1920's era if I'm not mistaken. He may have carried this knife in the war, I honestly don't know. I suppose it could have belonged to my great grandfather at some point. This one will be handed down to my son someday.

 

[will62]

Guess they were a little more knife savvy than we are today. Saw some stuff done that most people would not try today, ie skinning a deer with a small trapper. Takes a little time but it can be done.

 

[jackknife]

You know, there's one thing about our grandfathers that had a great influence on what they carried. We've all seen the old pocket knife that has been used for 40 years, with the blades sharpened down to a couple of toothpicks.

Our grandfathers did not have the large disposable income that young people have today. Back then, a dollar had to go far. A lot of people married younger than today, and by the time a man was in his mid 20's, he had a wife and kids to clothe and feed, and be responsible for. He couldn't afford to go out and buy the new knife of the month as touted by the magazines. For the most part, the old timers had to be a practical bunch, almost to the point of Puritanical. Back then you didn't buy a new anything, if the old one still had some miles in it. Car's, truck's, and knives fell into that category. Their's was the age of making do, of fixing things instead of tossing them and buying a new one.

Being a frugal lot, I'll bet a lot of thought went into the purchase of anything back then. A pocket knife was bought with the idea that it had to be suitable to one's life style, and do as many different jobs as possible. Thus a farmer who was outside doing manual labor around his property may pick a stockman for the choice of three blades, and office working city guy would pick a small pen knife or such. But I'd bet neither man would go out a few months later, or even a year later, and buy a second knife if he still had the first one. Oh, I'm sure there were knife kuts around then, but I'd also bet they were very far fewer and much farther between than now or the last 25 years.

So when we look at grandpa's old stockman, or pen knife, and see decades of wear on that tool, we have to realize that this was most likely to have been his only knife, and it had to serve a wide range of duties. And for a very long time. Today we see postings of people's personal knife collections of a hundred knives or so, and most of them in mint condition. I have my doubts that you would have ever seen that in our granddad's days.

Just a few stray thoughts.

Carl.

 

[soybean]

Reading through this thread inspired me enough to pull out one of my most treasured knives. My grandpa's been gone 26 years this Oct. 31st. He was born in 1915. As Jackknife mentions; those that lived through those times tended to use it up, wear it out, make it do. This knife was my Granddads pride and joy. My father bought it for him while serving in the navy in 1959-60.

I as a young knifeaholic used to covet my Grandpa's knife something fierce. He used to make a big deal of using it and letting me see it, but always gently telling me that I could have about anything he had except that knife. He told me someday it would be mine. That day came much too soon. I had it in my pocket at his wake and funeral. It seemed to be a lonely reminder of a great guy that had even fueled the knife collector in me. He gave me several knives along the way, but the one I thought was the coolest was his to the very end.

He used this knife for everything. He was old school with his sharpening technique. He would use a figure 8 across an old grey stone. He obviously used 1 blade most of the time. As it turned into a tooth pick he started using the second blade more and more. He lost this knife a couple of times and would always carefully retrace his steps until he found it again. Holding it in my hand puts a little lump in my throat, and believe it or not when I actually hold it to my nose and breathe in I can still faintly recall him a little more clearly. Something about how much he carried and used it daily along with the few stray flakes of Prince Albert that really make me feel just a little bit of him here on earth.

 

[solocanoe]

After I read his story...I dug out the knife my grandpa gave me. I called him Papa.

I have no idea what kind of knife this is...but it means the world to me.
Many thanks to Jackknife for invoking some treasured memories.:thumbup:

Papa was a RR conductor and carried these daily in his pocket. Knife, stone, sheath...he carried them all, every day. He died in the 1970's...and was born in the 1800's. I haven't thought of him in TOO long...good stuff.

 

[solocanoe]

I'd just like to appologize for starting a new thread. I should have just posted my Papa's knife here. I think I was just overwhelmed with memories.
Your knives are all so beautiful. The stories are better!

I've been "tactical" since I was 18 and in basic training. I'm in my 40's now.
I don't even know why I clicked on Jackknife's story...but this whole subforum is a wonderful kick of nostalgia.
Glad you all are keeping these wonderful knives alive. :thumbup:


edited by blues to add: easily remedied. your thread is now the post just above this one. it's been merged per your wishes.

 

[solocanoe]

very nice, blues. thanks so much. :thumbup:

 

[orca8589]

Here's a couple; the first is a Camillus TL-29 that I found in my (maternal) grandmother's garage, and she said I could have it. She used it to open fertilizer bags and do yard work, so the main blade is pretty corroded but still sharp, and the screwdriver blade still has a lot of the origianl factory polish left on it. It had belonged to my grandfather, and family tradition says he carried it while in the Army Of Occupation in Japan after the surrender. (I have no way to verify this, since (according to my grandmother) the men who were part of the Army Of Occupation were absolutely forbidden to take any weapons at all with them while there in Japan. They may have allowed him to carry this knife, but I'm not sure. Makes a nice story though. )

3/7/2012: Edited to add - from the sixth picture in this thread, I think the one I have was made after 1946.
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/497708-Camillus-Tang-stamps-and-dates

We know he had a knife like this with him, but I don't think it's this one.

After the war, he was working for the North Carolina Dept. Of Agriculture, and had a truckload of equipment he used. He carried several other knives, but the family doesn't know where any of the others are.

The second one belonged to my paternal grandfather; it's a Schrade/Walden Rigger's Knife. My dad gave it to his father back in the early-to-mid sixties, I think he got it from a Navy Commissary. My granddad told him several times over the years that it was his favorite knife.

Later, when my granddad died, my dad found it in his fishing box, and it had been sitting on or in something had dissolved or corroded the scale off one side. It barely stays on now, and little pieces fall off every time I get it out.

~Chris

 

[coop1957]

My Father was a Police Officer from 1955 to 1985 in PIttsburgh. He carried a Case Barlow everyday in his front pocket. Not sure when/where he got it. Now it often sees rotation in my front pocket.